Welcome to Mines Robotics Club!
Did you do Robotics in high school? Do you LOVE robotics? Have you never done robotics in your life but want to learn now? Look no further than Mines Robotics club! Robotics Club offers opportunities to learn more about design, construction, programming, and characterization of robotic systems via regional and national robotic competitions. Read on to learn more!
Our Competitions:
ASME Design Competition
Each year, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) hosts regional conferences (rightly named “Engineering Festivals”, or E-Fests for short). At these E-fests, there are several competitions students can participate in, and one of those is the Student Design Competition. The competition varies each year. From a Robot Pentathlon in 2017, to a Robotic soccer game in 2018, the competition often focuses on robotics. As a result, Mines Robotics pairs with Mines’ own ASME Chapter to send a team of students to our regional E-fest.
Space Grant Consortium
Space Grant Robotics is a Colorado-based robotics competition hosted in Great Sand Dunes National Park (only a few hours drive from Mines). The competition requires students to build a robot “no larger than a cat” that can autonomously navigate to the center of an obstacle course. The purpose for hosting at the Sand Dunes is to simulate an environment analogous to that on Mars (hence the “Space” part of the competition). Given the lower budget and time commitment, this competition is perfectly suited to those with little experience in robotics.
IEEE Robotics Competition
Despite being hosted by IEEE (the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), this competition encourages a multidisciplinary team (not just electrical engineers) of 5 students to design a robot for a unique game each year. Though the game changes slightly each year, the focus is on autonomous navigation. This competition is usually for those with more experience in the field of robotics. Last year’s competition was hosted in Austin; the previous year, it was in our own city of Denver.
STARX Exoskeleton Competition
Have a strong interest in biomedical engineering? The STARX (Strength Augmenting Robot Exoskeletons) competition started just last year (2018) at the University of Michigan. Teams are tasked with building exoskeleton suits for humans that can traverse a path similar to a firefighter’s training.
agBots Weed & Feed Competition
This upcoming year will be Mines Robotics Club’s first time competing in the agBots Weed & Feed Competition. This competition is for those with an interest in agricultural robotics. The agBot Competition consisted of two challenges last year in 2018: a challenge for pest and weed identification and eradication and a second challenge for harvest method robotics. We will be competing in the first challenge this upcoming year.